MSI X570-A PRO Motherboard Review

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Memory Support

The MSI X570-A PRO supports up to 128GB of dual-channel DDR4 memory using 4x DIMMs. The slots are not color-coded and oddly, they are reversed from their normal orientation. This is something I’ve started seeing on motherboards recently. These have single-sided locking tabs which are normally used for situations where the RAM slots are too close to the expansion area. Flipped around, these don’t make any sense. Furthermore, there is plenty of space negating the need for using this type of slot at all.

MSI X570-A PRO Motherboard Memory DIMMS

The MSI X570-A PRO is a daisy chain topology motherboard favoring two-DIMM configurations allowing for greater overall memory clock speed. Utilizing 4x DIMMs is certainly possible, but such a configuration is less than ideal and can be problematic.

Expansion

The expansion slot area is well thought out with spacing for expansion slots being ideal for dual GPU configurations or any setup which utilizes larger PCIe cards in the secondary slot. There are two PCIe x16 slots and three PCIe x1 slots. All of which are Gen 4.0 compliant. The PCIe x16 slots support configurations of x16/x0 and x16/x4. There are also two M.2 slots, both of which are PCIe/NVMe capable PCIe 4.0 x4. The primary slot is also capable of using legacy SATA style devices. The first M.2 slot supports devices up to 110mm in length, while the secondary M.2 slot is limited to 80mm and shorter devices.

One thing to note here is that the PCIe Steel Armor which reinforces the primary PCIe x16 slot makes a lot of sense given the relatively thin PCB. This steel armor reinforces the slot making it resistant to sheering and plate bending.

I/O Panel

The I/O panel is rather sparse. This is to be expected given the budget nature of the board. You will find two USB 1.1/2.0 ports, 4x USB 3.x Gen 1 ports, 2x USB 3.2 Gen 2 ports (one type-A, one type-C), 1x RJ-45 LAN port, 1x combination PS/2 keyboard or mouse port, 1x optical output, and 5x mini-stereo jacks for analog audio output.

MSI X570-A PRO Motherboard I/O Panel

Despite the budget nature of the board, I would like to have seen a built-in I/O shield. I really don’t think they cost much if any more than standard ones. This is a feature that I think should be standard on all motherboards. The first time I saw it, I wondered why I/O panels hadn’t always been like that.

UEFI BIOS

The MSI X570-A PRO utilizes a single 256Mb (32MB) UEFI BIOS ROM. It is soldered to the PCB and does have support for BIOS Flashback. This allows for the BIOS to be updated even if a supported CPU isn’t installed in the system. This is quite surprising at this price point and a welcome feature. At the time of this writing, 7C37vHC1 is the latest BIOS. However, this was released after all the testing had been conducted. Also, this adds support for AMD Smart Access Memory. Testing for this is beyond the scope of this article. Version 7C37vHB (as it’s listed on MSI’s website) or E7C37AMS.HB0 (as shown in the UEFI) was used for all testing and screenshots.

Despite the motherboard’s lean nature, the UEFI BIOS implementation is quite good. Essentially, the color scheme notwithstanding the MSI X570-A PRO gives you virtually the same UEFI user experience you would see with a higher end motherboard from the same company. However, due to hardware limitations, you won’t have the same adjustment ranges for all settings. Typically, voltages, clock speeds, and the like are adjusted in larger increments due to the fact that the hardware required to support finer adjustments isn’t present. The clock generator won’t be as robust and the voltage controller won’t support the same level of fine-tuning.

That being said, the UEFI BIOS of the X570-A PRO provides more than enough flexibility to achieve quite a bit on the overclocking front. Unless you are using liquid nitrogen or really trying to squeeze just a few MHz out of a CPU, you don’t need much to hit a decent all-core overclock. In spite of its budget-oriented design, the MSI X570-A PRO can deliver enough to satisfy most user’s needs as far as the UEFI is concerned anyway.

The user experience itself is rather good. On the positive side, the layout makes for relatively easy navigation, and information is generally displayed in a way that makes taking it in at a glance rather easy. Visually, the lack of color and high contrast is a subjective area but I think it works well. The BIOS also displays some basic help and information for some settings which makes things easy enough for the novice. Another solid feature is the Easy Mode, which is among the best in existence.

I do have some issues with the BIOS though. On the downside, MSI uses far too many sub-menus for organization forcing you to drill down for basic settings. More detailed information isn’t necessarily hidden but may require navigating through unnecessarily complex menus just to find something. Fortunately, the basics are covered well enough that this is a minor inconvenience.

MSI does force you to perform a reboot to get into a UEFI flash mode. This isn’t necessary and I have yet to learn why it is MSI does this. No other brand forces this. It’s not a huge deal but I always found it annoying. MSI also has an unnecessarily complicated boot device order in that it’s excessively deep. It allows you to select up to 12 or 13 devices and configure them in a boot order. When set to UEFI as opposed to legacy+UEFI, this drops to a more reasonable 7 devices.

MSI’s interface is good but among the larger manufacturers, it’s one of my personal least favorites in most respects. I do like their monitoring and fan controls. While better than most, they still aren’t the best. So, it’s a middle of the road implementation in my opinion.

Utilities are good, but not stellar. The afore-mentioned BIOS flash feature works very well but is a bit annoying to use. The overclocking profiles menu is quite good but is a carbon copy of others on the market. The board explorer is OK, but honestly not that useful compared to some other ways of providing similar information. Overall, I like the MSI X570-A PRO’s BIOS.

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Dan Dobrowolski
Dan has been writing motherboard reviews for the past 15 years, with the first decade or so writing for [H}ard|OCP. Dan brings his depth of knowledge about motherboards and their components to his reviews here at The FPS Review to help you select the best one for your needs.

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